Is there anything more to Ghost Protocol than spectacle and style? Well, no, not really. That, some gorgeous globe-hopping backdrops (beautifully filmed by director of photography Robert Elswit) and the considerable star power of Cruise and his costers.

These include returning comic sidekick Simon Pegg (Scotty in Abrams’ Star Trek) as tech agent Benji Dunn; Jeremy Renner (The Hurt Locker) as an enigmatic desk agent; Paula Patton (Déjà Vu, Jumping the Broom) replacing Maggie Q in the role of Kickboxing Female Agent who Gets out of a Snazzy Sportscar in a Slinky Dress at Some Fancy Soirée. The story gives these characters just enough personal history to have motivations and emotions that are important to them, if not to us, but that’s enough to be serviceable.

Bird’s animated films are so full of heart and ideas that one could reasonably have hoped for a transformational take on Mission: Impossible for his live-action debut. Instead, for the first time directing from a screenplay he neither wrote himself nor rewrote (as he rewrote Ratatouille after taking over the project from Jan Pinkava), Bird has taken the opportunity to flex his muscles—to showcase for the world, and possibly to discover for himself, what he can do in a new medium.

Other extraordinary sequences include a chase sequence in a sandstorm in which visibility drops to zero and a climactic hand-to-hand combat in a high-rise robotic parking garage with cars on hydraulic platforms moving up and down. I can’t think of anything offhand comparable to either one.

One thing that makes these scenes special is the way Bird injects personality into them. An opening set piece, with Hunt breaking out of a Russian prison amid a prisoner riot, comes to a head in a silent exchange between Hunt and Benji Dunn in which neither party can hear the other, and Hunt can’t even see Benji, but each knows exactly what the other is thinking.

In other sequences, the movie’s most reliable gambit is for the Impossible Missions Force’s high-tech gadgets—some of which are among the most inspired gadgets we’ve seen in a long time—to fail, forcing the agents to improvise. This isn’t played for mere cleverness, but for how the characters respond, and it ratchets up the suspense to tightrope tension.

I also really like a few wincing moments when Hunt doesn’t quite nail his landings, with potentially disastrous consequences. Fallibility and vulnerability make a hero more appealing, like Indiana Jones not quite making that first jump in the Peruvian temple, or landing hard on his backside when slugged by the burly German pilot. (By contrast, an opening stunt with an IMF agent landing a crazy backward jump off a roof onto an absurdly tiny airbag sets an unfortunate precedent that the movie doesn’t shake off for awhile—and the rolling climactic sequence goes too far in allowing its heroes to shrug off ridiculous amounts of physical punishment.)

Ultimately, the movie’s breezy confidence and lighthearted tone is a big part of its success. Like all the best moments in the Mission: Impossible films so far, Ghost Protocol is a romp, and it knows it. In my review of Mission: Impossible III I commented that “for the first time a Mission: Impossible movie has a level of emotional urgency. The downside is, having seen it, I’m not sure I want emotional urgency in a Mission: Impossible movie.” Ghost Protocol has just about everything I want in a Mission: Impossible movie, and just about nothing that I don’t.

Content advisory:Much intense action violence, sometimes deadly; brief unclear reference to killings in a heroic character’s past; some suggestive content including images of erotic art; a few instances of profanity and some crass language.

Comments

Once again, your review hits the nail on the head, Steven. Ghost Protocol was constantly in motion, exhilarating, and eye-popping. What it tried to do, it did very well. It just didn’t try to do more than that.

My teenage daughter liked Game of Shadows better, simply because she likes a story better. As she left Ghost Protocol last night, she said essentially what I quoted from you. She said, It seemed after a while like they were just doing stunts simply to do stunts. (It gave me an opportunity to introduce her to the “McGuffin”.)

Game of Shadows, on the other hand, kept her engaged in the story. I’m tempted to agree with her. Instead, I’ll just say that if you liked the pervious M:I‘s and Sherlock, you’ll like these new ones.

The Bourne triology stills sets the platinum-standard for “spy-action” films.

Posted by TheologyGeek on Tuesday, Dec 20, 2011 1:04 PM (EST):

I saw Ghost Protocol this weekend. It was a fantastic movie. The best of the MI movies for sure. I saw it in a HDX theater 9larger screen, better sound). If you have the chance, this movie is worth the extra $ for HDX or IMAX.

www.theologygeek.blogspot.com

Posted by Rachel W. on Monday, Dec 19, 2011 7:25 PM (EST):

Taking off on the Sherlock Holmes tangent - if filiusdextris and Adolfo are discussing the BBC’s Sherlock (modern times, etc.) it is fantastic. Those three episodes were just not enough…..waiting….waiting….waiting

Posted by Adolfo on Sunday, Dec 18, 2011 11:12 AM (EST):

Sherlock 2 has a new TDKR trailer before it, so I think I’ll pay just to see that.

Posted by filiusdextris on Saturday, Dec 17, 2011 7:16 PM (EST):

Man, I’ve been salivating for the next ‘Sherlock’ t.v. episodes (as distinct from the Sherlock Holmes movie). My wife and I think the three episodes from the first season were the best thing on television ever. Season 2 is slightly overdue now.

Heh. It just occurred to me: People say “You had me at X” all the time … but it was Cruise, the star of this movie, who started that viral catchphrase, back in Jerry Maguire, so there’s something especially appropriate about saying it in this context.

It’s like how in Bruce Almighty Morgan Freeman (as God) says to Jim Carrey, “All rightee then.” It took me a beat to process that Freeman had uttered to Carrey Carrey’s own viral catchphrase from Ace Ventura.

Posted by Nicholas Jagneaux on Saturday, Dec 17, 2011 9:38 AM (EST):

I saw Game of Shadows last evening with my teenage daughter and her 3 friends. Everyone enjoyed the movie. I give it a B-. It doesn’t build on the first one, just takes what was good about it and amps it up - but almost to the point of distortion.

If you liked the first one, you’ll like this one. The same strengths (good visual effects and stunts; nice recreation of the time period; pretty good acting) and the same weaknesses (overly long with a muddled plot and slow pacing at the beginning.)

My complaint from the first movie continues: the character that Robert Downey, Jr. plays should not be called Sherlock Holmes. Call him “John Smith” or anything else, but not Holmes. If fact, none of the characters from the Holmes series are portrayed correctly.

Well, I’ll SDG to comment in more depth on that.

As for Ghost Protocol, I can’t wait to go see it. Like the others here, I was pleased to see Brad Bird attached to the movie and had high hopes.

Finally, 2011 brings some movies that I really want to see, including Tintin and War Horse (though I won’t be in theatres on Christmas Day to watch that one).

Fr. Maurer: I saw Game of Shadows (about 45 minutes after Ghost Protocol, as it happens). I wasn’t thrilled. I reviewed it on my radio shows this morning; don’t know if I’ll get to a written review any time soon.

Posted by The Ubiquitous on Friday, Dec 16, 2011 10:57 PM (EST):

Ditto, Victor.

Posted by victor on Friday, Dec 16, 2011 7:18 PM (EST):

You had me at “Brad Bird’s”.

Posted by Fr. Maurer on Friday, Dec 16, 2011 6:46 PM (EST):

New Sherlock movie, that is.

Posted by Fr. Maurer on Friday, Dec 16, 2011 6:46 PM (EST):

Steven - do you say that because you liked MI:Ghost Protocol so much, or because you have seen the new one and dislike it?

Posted by Kerri on Friday, Dec 16, 2011 4:52 PM (EST):

I hope you will review the new Sherlock film. I’ve been looking forward to it.

OK, it’s settled. First the news that it will have a lengthy Dark Knight Rises preview attached to it, then your review. Sherlock Holmes can wait a bit.

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About Steven D. Greydanus

Steven D. Greydanus is film critic for the National Catholic Register and Decent Films, the online home for his film writing. He writes regularly for Christianity Today, Catholic World Report and other venues, and is a regular guest on several radio shows. Steven has contributed several entries to the New Catholic Encyclopedia, including “The Church and Film” and a number of filmmaker biographies. He has also written about film for the Encyclopedia of Catholic Social Thought, Social Science, and Social Policy. He has a BFA in Media Arts from the School of Visual Arts in New York, and an MA in Religious Studies from St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Overbrook, PA. He is pursuing diaconal studies in the Archdiocese of Newark. Steven and Suzanne have seven children.